The importance of hydration is huge in every day life, let alone during sporting activities, where the body is exposed to much higher levels of intensity. Consuming less than adequate fluids before, during, and after a sporting activity, can lead to what's known as dehydration.
As an athlete sweats, which is the body's cooling system, fluid needs to be replaced in order for the body's heat management system to function correctly, if not, then dehydration will occur, which will include a variety of symptoms.
The most Common symptoms of dehydration include thirst, increased fatigue, increased body temperatures and up to 30% loss of performance. The loss of performance is the crucial part of course; this leads to lack of; concentration, endurance, muscular strength and general productivity, a 30% loss in a sporting activity could be crucial, as well as dangerous.
When pushing your body to the extreme, sweat can escape from the body in excess of 1.0L per hour, which relates to 1-2% loss of body weight (for the average person), in just 60 minutes. As far as dehydration goes, prevention is the key, and by following a schedule for hydration, and by replacing the fluids lost during sporting activities, the chances of becoming dehydrated are greatly reduced.
Athletes can become hydrated for a number of reasons, the event maybe excess of 45 minutes long, heat maybe intense, or the athlete doesn't become thirsty, the later being the most important. The most common cause of dehydration is not drinking, due to not feeling thirsty. Different health conditions or state's of mind during sports activities; it is not viable to rely, solely on thirst.
So of course, the question is; how do we stay hydrated and maintain our performance levels?
The best way to stay hydrated is to follow a schedule for hydrating your body, which will date back to a few hours before your sporting activity, but needs to be followed:
- Drink 24-48oz of water 1-3 hours before exercise.
- Drink 4-8oz 15 minutes before exercise.
- Drink 4-8oz every 15 minutes during exercise.
- Replace your electrolytes with gatorade or similar sports drink at a rate of 2-6oz every 15 minutes.
- Drink 24-48oz within the 2 hours post exercise.
Almost every day I hear, ‘I just don’t have the time to exercise.’ Yet almost in the same breath a person talks about a favorite TV program or video game they were playing. If you have time to watch TV and or play video cgames you have time to do some physical activity. Instead of coming home and plopping in front of the television with your McDonald's or Wendy's food bag, grab a light dinner, perhaps a salad with grilled chicken with some fruit and nuts on top, and then head outside for a stroll around the neighborhood or to do some yard work. Go up and down your stairs a few times, dance to a tune on your Ipod while you vacuum or clean your house, run, jog or play with the kiddies. The idea is just get some blood pumping and your heart rate elevated to get those calories burnin'. Before you know it you will have some exercise time automatically built into your lifestyle! The most important piece of information that you need to take away from this is that you need to be disciplined enough to not vege out once you get home from work. It only takes an hour or two and once its done you will feel so much better!
